Occupational Hazard
by lap-of-the-gods
Summary: Getting thrown about on a hunt is nothing new. This time, Sam worries that Dean's injuries are worse than usual.


A/N: Written This is just a little somethin' for **si_star_x** over on LiveJournal for her birthday.

Written when I'm not feeling well and unbeta'd, so apologies for any glaring errors.

**Occupational Hazard**

Pain shot through Dean's back as he was slammed hard into the brick wall. He tried getting his legs under him as he slid down it, but between the semi-strangulation, and the punches, his limbs weren't co-operating.

He managed to draw in a ragged breath, his hand automatically reaching for his throat, but a strong arm caught it and pulled it away. Before he knew it, he was again being shoved up against the wall, held in place by a forearm to his throat; whilst the other again punched him repeatedly in the ribs and stomach. He was aware of footsteps which sounded like they were coming louder and faster, but he blacked out before he could confirm whether it was his oxygen starved brain playing tricks on him, or not.

~ . ~ . ~ . ~

Everything hurt. That was the first thing he thought when he slowly came back to consciousness. His head felt like someone took a battering ram to it, and his chest and abdomen felt like someone was crushing him with their entire weight.

His Hunter instincts kicking in, he tried to keep as quiet as possible, listening for any sign of where he might be. He opened his eyes a tiny bit, peering through his lashes. The room was mostly dark, the only apparent light was coming from a door left open a crack. He could make out blurred shapes, but unless he lifted his head to get a better look, he couldn't see anything else. Not wanting to move and draw attention to himself – not to mention that it fucking _hurt_ to move at the moment – he laid his head back down and listened harder.

He heard water running - a tap, yes it was a tap – then the familiar sound of a glass being filled. He swallowed automatically, realising at that moment how thirsty he was, and instantly regretted it. The sharp, burning pain he got almost made him cry out. He rolled his tongue around his mouth and swallowed again, trying to soothe his dry throat with saliva. It didn't work.

The room suddenly got brighter, and sound of approaching footsteps snapped him out of it. He heard the snap of plastic and a rattling sound, followed by a loud gulps and a heavy sigh – definitely the sound of someone taking pills. He remained as still as possible, still trying to pick out any more sounds to give him something else to go off. After a couple of minutes, he was certain that there was only one other person in the room. That at least was in his favour – in his current state there was no way he could take on more than one person.

A chair somewhere not far away creaked as someone sat on it, followed by a low whirring, then he heard the unmistakable sound of fingers tapping quickly on a keyboard. It made no sense - if someone had taken him, why would they be typing and not trying to torture information out of him? A pained cough drew his attention – putting it all together quickly, he had no doubt who was there.

"Sammy?" he croaked. He heard the chair creak again as he pushed himself up on his elbows. His entire abdomen protested at the movement, a burning in his chest and an intense throbbing all the way down to his left hip, had him crying out and dropping back down onto what he now realised was a bed.

"Dean! Dean just stay still, OK?"

His eyes had adjusted to the semi-darkness of the room now, and he saw the unmistakable shape of his Sasquatch of a brother approaching.

"Wha' happened?" he rasped.

Sam reached out to the nightstand next to him and brought a glass of ice water to Dean's lips. "Just small swallows," he said, "that guy did quite a number on you."

At that point Dean didn't think his throat could hurt any more, and took several long gulps of water, before the pain had him coughing some of it back up and all over himself.

"Jesus Dean, I said _small_ swallows. Trust me on this, I'm usually the one whose throat gets crushed – learn from my mistakes!"

"Shut up, Sam!" he rasped out, but did as he was told – it did hurt less, but he wasn't going to admit that to Sam. After letting the cold water sooth the pain slightly, he asked again, "What happened?"

"What do you remember?"

"I, er, there was a vamp. Did you get him?"

"No, as I got to you the guy took a swing at me, and then ran off."

"The _guy_? He wasn't a vamp? But we were so sure we were close to the nest." He pushed his upper body up, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed at the same time. "Arrgh, hmph, _shit_!"

Sam surged forward. "Damn it, Dean, I said stay still! I haven't had chance to check you out properly since we got back. You moaned with every bump in the road, but you didn't wake up. You've been like that for over an hour since we got here." He gently shoved at Dean's shoulder, the message clear – lie down.

Dean swatted his hand away, feeling himself getting lightheaded between the movement and the pain. He was starting to feel dizzy, and could feel sweat breaking out on his face. Even so, he glared at Sam, which in return earned him an eye roll.

"I don't think he was a vamp, I think he was a familiar. Look, we can talk about this later," he gestured towards Dean, "at the moment, let's just check you over and see what the damage is. I brought us to a different motel in case we were followed, but it's been a couple of hours and there's no sign of anyone. It'll be getting light soon, so I guess they'll be keeping watch over the nest."

Dean shifted slightly trying to take in a deep breath to steady the dizziness, but all that served to do was send another burn across his ribcage. He ran his fingers over them – even through the layers of clothes they were tender. "A couple of cracked ribs I'd say."

"Yeah, and the rest!" Sam grumbled. He stood, reaching towards his brother and pulling on his jacket.

"I can undress myself thank you very much, Sam. I've been doin' it for a long time now!" he groused.

Sam's Bitchface came out in full force, complete with arms folded over his chest in defiance.

Spotting his duffle on the other bed, Dean gestured with his head, "Pass me the whisky Sam, at least let me have that before you start prodding and poking me." He didn't look at his brother; he just began shrugging out of his jacket. "_OK, one layer down, two to go_." he told himself, fighting a wave of nausea.

By the time Dean had gotten all his layers off, he was breathing heavily, sweat pouring off him with the effort and pain. He sat back down on the bed to rest – just for a minute, or Sam would give him hell. It wasn't really _that_ bad, and he was sure they'd both taken a hell of a lot worse in the past! He picked up the remaining ice water and downed it in one, rubbing the cold glass across his forehead, before setting it back down.

He pulled himself back up off the bed and headed towards the bathroom. "OK Sammy, let's get this show on the road"!

~ . ~ . ~ . ~

After what felt like an hour, but was probably only ten minutes, Sam declared that he agreed with Dean - there were definitely two cracked ribs, and some slight bruising. Considering the force of the punches, it appeared he's gotten away lightly.

Sam had wanted to wrap Dean's ribs and ice the muscles straight away, but Dean just wanted a shower. Climbing under the hot water, he felt his muscles start to relax immediately. He stood there for several minutes, letting the water sooth him, until finally it became too much for the tender skin. It wasn't until he moved to wash himself that he realised just how tender it was. He could see bruises had begun appearing in several places. "_Great, now Sam's gonna be like a mother hen," _he muttered.

Drying his body took more effort than he'd anticipated. His throat still hurt like bitch -

the steam seemed to have helped a little, but the pain all over his body was getting worse. He was going to have to take some painkillers whether he liked it or not – which obviously, he didn't, he was Dean Winchester, damn it!

Sam looked up when he walked back into the room. He gestured to Dean's bed, where he'd laid out bandages, and ice pack, painkillers and the almost full bottle whisky. He'd also arranged the pillows from both beds so that Dean would be propped up in bed, making it easier for him to get comfortable with the cracked ribs.

Dean rolled his eyes. "Dude, I don't need all of that." he groused. He carefully tugged a pair of boxers from his duffel and put them on, before gently lowering himself onto the bed.

Sam just ignored him, and slipped from his own bed onto the floor between Dean's legs, and picked up a bandage. "Jesus," he gasped, running his fingers gently over Dean's belly.

"What?" Dean spat out, trying to pretend it didn't hurt, but Sam wasn't fooled. Now that he was in a fully lit room, he saw why Sam looked so worried. What seemed to be mild bruising in the light of the bathroom, wasn't. His left hip and his abdominal muscles were dotted with bruises of varying sizes. The worst bruising though, was low on his belly. The whole area under and to the left side of his belly button was totally mottled in shades of red, blue and purple. "Shit, that must've been what he did when he was choking me," he said, looking up at Sam, "I didn't know he'd got that many hits in." Gently he pressed a hand to his own belly – it felt like a stabbing pain, and a dull ache all at once. No wonder he felt like shit with the water pounding on it in the shower.

He grabbed the whisky bottle, and took a long, deep pull from it, ignoring the pain in his throat by this point. He looked down at Sam who was still staring at the bruises. "Looking at them ain't gonna make 'em go away, Sammy." he joked. Sam seemed to snap out of it then.

"OK, hold still while I wrap your ribs," he said, nudging Dean's arms up slightly, unfolding the end of the bandage and wrapping it around him, "and tell me if it's too tight.'

"Damn it, Sam, this isn't the first time you've strapped me up, don't be such a drama queen!"

"Dean, you could've been seriously hurt – you still could be! I really don't like the look of that bruising." He carried on bandaging Dean's chest, and Dean was convinced that Sam was talking more to himself than his brother. "Gonna need to put ice on themand keep an eye on you. Could be internal bleeding. Yeah, ice first, then maybe -"

Dean gripped Sam's chin and lifted his head so he could look his brother in the eye, which incidentally was also showing the first signs of bruising. "Dude, you're babbling. It's just bruising, nothing to worry about. We've both had plenty worse, and it won't be the last time. It's kind of an occupational hazard!"

Sam gave him a rueful smile, and tucked the edge of the bandage in. "Yeah I know, sorry. I just. If I'd got there quicker he might not have got the jump on you. Sorry."

"We could both have been quicker Sam, just let it go. Once I've had a rest I'll be good as new, then we'll go and find the vamp's nest, chop off their heads and then I'll track down the freak who did this and teach him not to hang about with blood suckers!"

"You're getting ahead of yourself. Here," he said, handing Dean the ice pack, and nudging his thigh to have him swivel up onto the bed. "put that on, I've got something else we can use as well."

"Something else?" he asked, while gently laying the ice pack on his stomach. He flinched at the cold, tensing his muscles involuntarily, causing him to feel like he was being punched all over again.

"Idiot." Sam muttered as he sat down on the edge of the bed. He had a small bag which they used to keep herbs and various other ritual items in. He rummaged through until he came up with a small bottle of oil. He poured some into his hands, and rubbed them together.

Dean eyed his suspiciously. "What the hell's that?"

"Arnica oil."

"Oh hell no, you're not making me stink of that stuff."

Sam just raised an eyebrow, and gestured with his chin for Dean to move the ice pack so he could get to get the bruised area.

"Come on Sam, what if we need it for a cleansing ritual? We don't know for sure it works on bruises."

"Dean, come on, man. Those bruises look nasty – it's been used since the 1500's or so, it words just fine, so quit your bitching!"

Reluctantly, and sighing loudly to make his point known, Dean lifted the ice pack. Sam began smoothing the oil all over his bruises, but even with the light touch, his belly throbbed and ached when it was touched.

"Take your pain pills, Dean."

"And you say _I'm_ bossy!" he said, washing their strongest pills down with another long pull from the whisky bottle.

After getting himself as comfortable as possible, the painkillers began working, and he managed to drift off to sleep.

~ . ~ . ~ . ~

The next morning, it felt even worse than when he last came around because this time, he was fully conscious. He managed to carefully sit up without jostling his ribs too much. They didn't feel quite as bad, but the rest of him did. He looked down at the bruising, which if anything had gotten even worse overnight. He cautiously poked at the tender skin, predictably, the most painful reaction from the one on his belly. It was now almost completely purple. "That's just freakin' wonderful."

The front door opened and Sam came in carrying what smelt like soup, a box of pastries, and two giant cups of coffee. Dean moaned in pleasure this time, as the smell hit him. He reached out and almost snatched the coffee from Sam, and took a large mouthful.

He stood and walked over to the table where Sam was putting the box and a stack of papers. "I hit the library, I think we have a lead on where the vamp's nest might be. There's an abandoned cabin in the woods about thirty miles away, we can check it out tomorrow or the day after, once you're up to it."

Dean slid into the chair nearest to him, and snatched a doughnut. "'m fine," he said around it, taking another bite, "let's go today and then get out of this place."

"Not a chance," Sam said in a tone which left little room for argument, "you took a hell of a beating Dean, and until we see an improvement in those bruises and I'm sure there's no internal injuries, we're staying put!"

~ . ~ . ~ . ~

A week later, Dean's ribs were still tender, but manageable. They'd take another few weeks to heal properly, but they were used to that.

The bruises on his abdomen had faded to a greeny brown colour now, and he barely noticed them unless he knocked them with something. The ones on his belly had faded to a lighter shade of purple, and still hurt when he stretched in the wrong way, and even when the waistband of his jeans touched it, but he reasoned that if he could feel pain, he was alive.

If he was really lucky, after they'd despatched the vamps and their familiar, he may even be able to find a girl in the next town who'd be more than happy to kiss those bruises better!

~ . ~ . ~ FIN ~ . ~ . ~

**End notes: Feedback is appreciated**


End file.
